Mortgages

The clash between the Department of Housing and Urban Development and its inspector general over down payment assistance programs run by state or local housing finance agencies continues to heat up.

Despite their major push to overhaul the housing finance market last Congress, Sens. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., and Mark Warner, D-Va., offered little optimism Tuesday that structural reform is on its way anytime soon.

An initiative underway at Freddie Mac seeks to integrate new and existing technology to create a comprehensive suite of quality control tools designed to help lenders manage their mortgage repurchase risks.

If we can't identify adequate capital to bear mortgage credit losses when they are incurred, aren't we setting ourselves up for another series of bailouts in the next housing downturn?

The Mortgage Bankers Association is disappointed that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has not provided an explicit temporary safe harbor for lenders who have made a good-faith effort to implement new disclosures.

WASHINGTON — Federal examiners will expect institutions to show that they made a "good faith" effort in preparing for the implementation of the new integrated mortgage disclosures that go into effect on Oct. 3, regulators said in letters sent to industry groups on Thursday.

Banks worldwide are in danger of losing significant profits in several lending areas to nonbank alternative lenders, according to a McKinsey study.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency is planning to issue a final rule in the next 12 months to require Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to better serve underserved markets, including manufactured housing, the agency said Thursday.

USAA will shift about 120 positions in its mortgage operations from an office near Dallas to offices in Tampa, Fla., and Phoenix.

JPMorgan Chase has paid off $3.56 billion of the $4 billion it owes in consumer relief credit as part of a 2013 settlement over marred mortgage-backed securities issued before the crisis.

WASHINGTON — The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is working with other regulators on examiner guidance to help ensure that the agencies enforce new mortgage disclosures in a "corrective" manner, not a "punitive" one, Director Richard Cordray said Tuesday.

A bipartisan group of housing experts is seeking to inject more discussion about the mortgage market into presidential campaigns.

It's hard to decide which is more surprising: that the largest U.S. bank has almost abandoned the business of making home loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration, that lots of big banks could be right behind it, or that the FHA might not even need to care.

Lenders that allow borrowers to shop for third-party settlement services face new liability, as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's integrated mortgage disclosure rules will let borrowers sue over problems with vendor lists.

Officials signaled that Hudson City Savings Bank's nearly $33 million settlement over redlining charges is only the first in what is likely to be a string of other cases.

Federal officials on Thursday ordered Hudson City Savings Bank to pay more than $27 million to resolve redlining allegations, the largest order of its kind and one that is likely to put larger banks on notice that redlining cases will be aggressively pursued.

Although new HMDA data shows no negative effects from CFPB mortgage rules that went into effect last year, industry representatives argue it isn't showing the full picture.

While Congress has been unable to pass housing finance reform, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have done a good job of adhering to some of the spirit of recent bipartisan legislation, according to Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics.

WASHINGTON — The number of mortgage originations dropped 31% to 6 million in 2014 due largely to a decline in refinancing as interest rates increased, according to a report issued Tuesday by the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council.

Bank of America shareholders voted Tuesday to allow Brian Moynihan to keep his dual titles of chairman and chief executive, with 63% of votes cast in favor of Moynihan.